Halloween Part ll : Dark Riddles

Really, one could go on and on about how dreadful the state of the world is and how we're all going to suffer the fate of our own absolution. But there's really no point in labouring a point. Better to get on with the next exciting chapter of life and see what it has in store. Out there in the great scheme of What Is, there are some fun times to be had. So why not throw a pebble in the water?

The crowning glory of every day is surely the realisation that we are here, now, with an opportunity to learn more tomorrow based on what we found this side of sunrise. For me, every day is cherry-topped by the realisation that the hunt for Dark Matter has taken humankind into universal territory which could explain a lot of things about the way we think.

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There are two kinds of matter, they say. Ordinary, and Dark. 
These two kinds of matter have a difference most stark.
One of them you cannot see, bathed in invisibility
The other one's in front of you, it's red and green and white and blue.

Well, there's a thing. Two very different kinds of matter. One plain as day, there in our face all the time. The other, totally invisible, we don't know what it's made of or what it might be like at all. All we know is that it's there and it probably makes up around 75% of the Universe. Only, it's not here, it's out there. The current question posed by scientists, to scientists, is, "Can we make Dark Matter in the lab?"

Shea Hembrey is a sculptor who's taken a plunge to make Dark Matter through his own artwork, an example of which is pictured. 
His exhibition, Dark Matters, is on view at the Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery.

Nature and mankind have had an uneasy relationship since the discovery of gold and its sacred form as wealth. Like a little lost W particle, Wealth sits close to Health on the one hand, and Stealth on the other. 

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While all the Universe out there is filled up with Dark Matter
Scientists are watching precious cosmo-constants shatter
The Higgs came out of knowhere bringing SUSY to her knees
Now new Dark Matter candidates are swarming round like bees

Supersymmetry, many have mournfully declared, is dead. SUSY is no more. Like the Monty Python Parrot Sketch, she is deceased yet still her existence is earnestly defended. This fiasco will probably go on for some time. Be amused.

Be even more amused by the candidates trotting out of the Particle Zoo at the heels of their faithful champions. Earnest competitors for the title of Dark Matter Discoverer are lifting to the show bench everything from WIMPs to things like gravitons which have yet to be defined by theoretical or experimental analysis. 

Here's Andrew Handley's marvellous collective of peculiar particles.

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When you turn off the lights tonight, and lie down to sleep in your cosy bed in the familiarity of your bedroom, spare a thought for the fact that you can't see your bedroom any more. You can't see what's downstairs, or outside, or anywhere, in fact, unless there's light shining on it and your eyes are there to soak up the photons.

Don't worry, put your trust in the scientists. Dark Matter is out there, making up 75% of the known Universe. But it's not in here, inside Earth's atmosphere, even though the atmosphere is invisible by night when there's no light from the Sun to make it blue. Dark Matter will have to be made in the lab if it's to find its way to Earth. So it won't be in your bedroom. Sweet dreams.